League of Legends outfit Golden Guardians have confirmed they will be deploying their Academy roster at the LCS Lock In tournament starting on Friday.
In Group A in the LCS Lock In, Golden Guardians are 15/1 to top their section.
All change
Zheng "Tony Top" Fen will take up the top laner role while jungler Ethan "Iconic" Wilkinson, mid laner Tommy "ry0ma" Le, AD carry Trevor "Stixxay" Hayes and support Jonathan "Chime" Pomponio make up the rest of the roster.
Like a number of other LOL sides, the Guardians will not be using their normal LCS group for this month's tournament.
However, there is one change to their Academy roster with "Stixxay" having taken the place of Vincent "Violet" Wong, who enjoyed a good run at the 2021 World Championship with former side Peace and is now experiencing visa problems.
General manager of Golden Guardians Danan Flander, however, confirmed the ongoing issues with various visas as a result of international recruitment, will be resolved by the time the LCS regular season arrives.
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Room for improvement
They will be looking for a significant improvement on last year's performance at the LCS Spring Split, in which they finished rock bottom of the standings during the regular season with 15 defeats from their 18 matches.
They fared slightly better in the consequent Summer Split, finishing the regular season with a 14-31 record, but will be hoping for a better 2022.
And like TSM, who will also fielding a second-string side, Guardians will be hoping their Academy stars can impress and lay down a marker for the season.
In a video announcement, the organization's general manager Flander said: "While, of course, the Academy team is competing in Lock In, our LCS team will continue practising with substitutes.
"You can fully expect that you'll see the entirety of our roster come week one."
